Saturday PM

It's been hot, muggy and close all day. I hated it - not helped by being really tired. Most exciting thing I’ve done was to put the final coat onto the front door.

I had to spend most of yesterday in Brighton - similar weather, so I left one meeting early and walked all the way from the Palace Pier to Hove along the seafront, really enjoyed it.

On the train there, which was overheated and overcrowded, a girl insisted on taking up an entire seat with her suitcase - her meat head boyfriend opposite gave everyone filthy looks so nobody wanted to ask her to move - not even the guard. She was a stupid looking woman with a facial piercing and very hairy arms, she spent the journey reading one of those trashy magazines with ‘human interest' stories like ‘raped by my grandfather and his whippet’ etc. The train home was just as crowded and overheated.

Back in Hastings - went quickly to see another client and ended up going for a drink with them. There was a couple sitting opposite who were obviously on a first date. He was good looking, she talked constantly and ate with her mouth open, bit’s of food flying across the table - he looked increasingly uncomfortable and disappointed. On the way home I had chips and curry sauce - I’ve been trying to get the smell of my hands all day.

I watched a bit of something called ‘Tumble’ on the TV earlier - it was just awful. How thin can you possibly stretch the word ‘celebrity’ before it breaks.

There is a house on the lower of my road that sold at the start of the year to a builder - he’s done a reasonable job of the inside (it’s quite a bit smaller than mine, has no dining room, a downstairs bathroom, hardly any garden and two tiny box bedrooms at the back - the bathroom is a flat roofed extension. I don’t think they have done a very good job of the exterior painting and there was a structural issue that frankly - I thought wasn’t really addressed well. It’s made the road looked better now that it’s done, and its is a good location. I assumed it was being rented out - but it’s gone on the market this week at £170k - that’s £72K than they paid for it. It’s probably overpriced, but that’s actually what these houses were worth before the crash in 2007, so we have finally gone back to where we were all that time ago. I need to hurry up and paint the front of mine - I’m letting everyone down. Really pleased with the colour of the front door - looks great, considering I bought it for 20 quid from the junk market and restored it myself. Need to buy a new letterbox tomorrow.

I'm actually working tomorrow and next week looks really busy - not complaining, every penny counts at the moment.